


Chosen Well

by Waldo



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Community: HorizonsSing, Episode Related, Episode: s01e04 Cyberwoman, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-07-09
Updated: 2008-07-09
Packaged: 2017-10-05 01:00:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/36029
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Waldo/pseuds/Waldo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"All of the… modifications have been removed, but really, she should be cremated.  Just in case we're wrong."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Chosen Well

**Author's Note:**

>   Written for the [](http://www.livejournal.com/users/horizonssing/profile)[**horizonssing**](http://www.livejournal.com/users/horizonssing/) [Day 9 Challenge](http://community.livejournal.com/horizonssing/3827.html) which was this quote:  
> _"I walk without flinching through the burning cathedral of the summer. _  
> _My bank of wild grass is majestic and full of music. _  
> _It is a fire that solitude presses against my lips."_
> 
>  
> 
> _\- Violette Leduc, Mad in Pursuit_

It was three days into the third week of Ianto's suspension that Jack told him it was time. Jack, who had been coming over every day and making sure that Ianto was eating and bathing and trying to at least appear normal from the outside. Jack, who had become more sincere in his apologies for what had to be done, more sincere in his compassion for Ianto's grief. Jack, who had become more physical in his offers of comfort – comfort Ianto now knows he could never live without. He'd been without for almost eight months during one of the most trying times of his life. He wasn't in any position to turn Jack away and each day he wanted to less and less. It wasn't sexual, but after not having so much as a hug for almost a year, Ianto was touch-starved and he knew it. He was reasonably sure that Jack knew it too.

Jack looked weary when he showed up that Tuesday night. He didn't have food or a movie or a piece of alien tech he though Ianto might be able to help him with. He simply took Ianto by the hand and led him to the sofa.

"Owen's done with the autopsy. He thinks all of the… modifications have been removed, but we both agree that, really, she should be cremated. Just in case we're wrong."

Ianto stared at his knees.  Jack took his hand and squeezed it.

"Her family has a plot up in –"

"Ianto we can't," Jack interrupted firmly. "You know we can't. How do we explain that months after an attack everyone thinks was mass hallucination, you're bringing home her body?" Jack reached over and gently caressed Ianto's cheek.  "They could never see the body anyway, she's too…" he sighed, "There's too much damage, Ianto. The technology was too deeply embedded."

Ianto slumped against the back of the couch, silent.

"You don't have to be there," Jack whispered.

"I should go," Ianto answered, not meeting Jack's eyes. "I owe her that much."

&lt;{*}&gt;

It was early in the afternoon when Jack arrived the next day. Usually he didn't come by until dinnertime or later. Ianto had just made lunch. Made it, stared at it and binned it.  Jack had sent a text message earlier that they'd be going out into the mountains; that he should dress appropriately.

It clawed at Ianto to not even be able to dress appropriately for her funeral. But Jack was right. They were somehow going to be disguising a cremation out in the middle of the Cambrian Mountains. It wouldn't do to show up in a black suit and polished shoes if this was to remain a covert operation. Ianto owed it to Jack to show him that he'd learned to do things his way, to not question and not put his own needs above the needs of the team and the overall mission of Torchwood.

Instead he'd put on a dark green jumper and a pair of indigo jeans and brown hiking boots and he hoped he'd blend in well enough.

"We need to take your car," Jack said as Ianto finished cleaning up the mess of the lunch he hadn't eaten. "Owen took the SUV up this morning to arrange everything." Jack didn't tell him that he had followed in Owen's car to help make sure everything was done with as much respect as they could manage. Owen was still bitter about the whole experience, but Jack was able to convince him to remember that Lisa hadn't asked for any of this. And really, neither had Ianto.

Jack had brought Owen's car back to the hub and walked to Ianto's flat. Jack left unsaid that he didn't want Ianto driving back alone after it was over. And he wanted to make it harder for Ianto to end up alone at the end of the night. He held out a hand. "Let me drive."

Ianto wordlessly handed over the keys.

&lt;{*}&gt;

They were well off the beaten path, Ianto noticed, half wondering if his insurance would cover the suspension damage he suspected was occurring as Jack made his way into the woods, winding between trees and going over rocks and large sticks. He understood why this couldn't be done near a road, but he was beginning to wonder if they'd ever find their way back to civilization.

Eventually, just as the sky was starting to darken, Ianto saw it. A low wood pyre with a human shaped bundle wrapped in white lying atop it. He swallowed. This was so unorthadox as it was, but he'd still hoped to see her. Despite what Jack had implied about the damage done to her body as they'd removed the cyber-attachments, he'd wanted to kiss her goodbye, to touch her hair one more time.

He found himself stumbling from the car without thinking about it. He could hear Jack talking to Owen behind him, but the words were white noise as he finally rested a hand on the white swaddling. He wanted to say something, but had no idea what would be appropriate. _I'm sorry_? _I love you_? _It should have been me_?

After several long minutes he felt Jack's hand on his waist, pulling him away. He stumbled over the uneven ground, made even more treacherous by the tears blurring his vision. Jack caught him, but when he looked up it was Owen that he saw. He blinked, not sure what was expected of him.

"We have an alien incendiary device built into the…" Owen trailed off not sure what to call it. He indicated it with his head, instead. "It'll help it burn faster and more completely… just a couple of hours, but we need stay back."

Ianto nodded and stumbled back a few more steps and watched as Owen took a small box from his pocket. Assuming it to be the ignition switch he held out a hand. "Let me," he whispered with a hoarse voice.

"Ianto…" Jack cautioned.

"Let me," he said again forcing himself to sound stronger than he felt.

Owen looked to Jack and waited for him to nod before handing over the simple board with one button.

Ianto held it in his hand, thinking idly that it was lighter than it looked, far too simple to be what would destroy the only part of Lisa he had left.  He still felt there should have been something said, some kind of ceremony, but again was at a loss to capture in words everything that was so very wrong with that moment. Trying to find solace in the fact that her family had held a funeral months ago, in the fact that this was nothing more than the shell of a woman who never had made it out of London, in the fact that it really was safer for the world at large if they knew that all traces of the last surviving cyberperson was truly destroyed.

He looked across the dozen or so yards to the pyre. "I love you," he finally whispered as he pressed the button.

Flames consumed the wood and the body instantly. Ianto flinched back from the flare, not realizing how dark it had already gotten, how much brighter it was now.

Within moments the flames destroyed the center supports, causing the body to collapse into the hotter interior. Ianto figured that was deliberate design. If anyone came by now, it would just look like a ridiculously big bonfire and less like a cremation out in an open area of a forest in the middle of Wales.

Eventually Jack moved up behind him, dropping his greatcoat around Ianto's shoulders and standing behind him, hands on his shoulders as they watched the flames. It wasn't until several minutes later that Ianto realized he'd been shaking, though with the size of the fire he was standing next to, he doubted it was from the cold. But he appreciated Jack's gesture all the same.

Three hours later the flames were out and only a few glowing coals and a six-foot patch of scorched dirt were all that remained of the funeral pyre. Of Lisa. Through the fog in his head, Ianto could hear Owen telling Jack that he'd finish the clean up of the site.

The sounds of the flames roaring and the wood popping was still echoing in his head as Jack led him back to the car and got him settled in the passenger's seat. Even after he'd clicked Ianto's seatbelt, Jack stayed kneeling next to him. "Ianto? You okay?" he whispered, his hand on Ianto's cheek, forcing Ianto to look at him.

Ianto nodded, not having the energy to speak.

"We're going to go, okay?" Jack asked, not completely sanguine with the shocky reaction he was getting from Ianto.

"Yeah," Ianto finally answered. "There's nothing left now, right?"

Jack shook his head. "No. It's all over now."

Ianto's eyes finally focused on Jack. "Is it?" he asked, hoping Jack would understand what he meant.

"Yeah, it is. I want you to take another couple days to get your feet back under you, then you'll come in on Monday like we planned." Jack reached over and squeezed his hand. "For tonight, how about if I get you home and crash on your couch in case you need anything."

Ianto was too tired, too weary to give the standard, "I'm fine and I don't mean to be a bother" line. The truth was, he couldn't think of anything – short of getting Lisa back – that would make him feel better than knowing that Jack not only forgave him, but that even after all this he liked him enough to want to help. "Thank you," he whispered instead as he squeezed Jack's hand back as Jack stood to go around and take them home.

The full moon made navigating back to the road slightly less difficult than it could have been. It also gave Ianto a chance to really look at the mountainside Jack had chosen. He'd been so full of grief and anger on the way in that he hadn't really seen it. But now, with everything behind him, he realized that as final resting places went, Jack had chosen well for Lisa.


End file.
